All posts tagged Diversity

The technology workforce is becoming more diverse, though women still lag.

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It’s no secret that Silicon Valley has a diversity problem. That became evident after the disclosure of workforce-diversity statistics last year at Google Inc., Facebook Inc., and other tech firms, which showed that some of the biggest corporate names—and wealth generators—in the U.S. employ small numbers of African-American and Hispanic professionals and a disproportionate number of male employees.

Those numbers may be obscuring a more nuanced picture of the tech labor market, one that shows strong progress for racial minorities, though not for women, according to a paper to be released Thursday by the Progressive Policy Institute.

The Washington think tank found that in 2014, black and Hispanic workers comprised more than 12% of total tech employment, compared to 9% in 2009.

The number of black college graduates in tech jobs grew by 58% during that time, with large increases among computer programmers, software developers, database administrators, and network and computer systems analysts. Hispanic employment in tech jobs rose by 103%. Read More »

For the last six years, the search firm Heidrick & Struggles has analyzed the share of newly appointed board members at Fortune 500 companies who are female. Back in 2009, 18% of new board members were women; last year, it was 29%. And Catalyst’s analysis of the S&P 500 – using data from October 2014 — finds that the number of companies with zero women on their boards dropped to 18 – or 3.6% — from 25 a year earlier, a sign that more companies are taking action. Read More »

When women and men work together, the result is good for business—but apparently they don’t enjoy it much.

That, at least, is the experience of employees in one company, a large US professional services firm studied by economists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and George Washington University.

Researchers looked at eight years of the firm’s revenue data and employee surveys, measuring satisfaction, cooperation, morale and attitudes toward diversity. That included data from offices or teams that were entirely male or entirely female, along with data from teams that were more evenly mixed.

On surveys, individual employees reported higher levels of job satisfaction when they were on teams that were mainly staffed with people of their own gender. Those on more diverse teams reported lower levels of happiness, trust and cooperation, although revenue figures showed they were more productive and better performing—by a lot. Read More »

Dedication to diversity can be a liability in the workplace, according to a new study.

Researchers at the University of Colorado found that women and non-whites executives who push for women and non-whites to be hired and promoted suffer when it comes to their own performance reviews. A woman who shepherds women up the ranks, for example, is perceived as less warm, while a non-white who promotes diversity is perceived as less competent. Both end up being rated less highly by their bosses, according to the paper, which is set to be presented at an Academy of Management conference next month.

“Women can lean in and try to bridge the confidence gap all they want, but they’re going to be penalized for advocating for other women, just like non-whites are,” said David Hekman, an author of the study and an assistant professor of management at the University of Colorado’s Leeds School of Business.

Often, having women or minorities atop a company is perceived as a marker of progress for diversity efforts, but Hekman’s research suggests their presence might not have a large impact on the rest of the organization. If they believe it’s too risky to advocate for their own groups, it makes sense that successful women and non-white leaders would end up surrounded by white males in the executive suite, he said. Read More »

Stephen Mack remembers the conversation well. He had traveled to his parents’ home for Thanksgiving and was talking with his father, John Mack, the former chairman and chief executive of Morgan Stanley. The elder Mack mentioned something about the financial services firm that was “kind of confidential,” Stephen said.

Stephen steeled himself and began, “‘While we’re on the topic of sharing things…” Then, he told his father he was gay.

Learning that a child is gay prompts change in any families. But when Dad is a CEO, the revelation can have effects far outside the family unit. Bosses who thought infrequently, if ever, about lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues have a new perspective on diversity initiatives at their businesses, and sometimes become activists–in a similar way, research has shown male CEOs with young daughters often champion pay equity for women. Read More »

Entelo Inc., maker of a recruiting platform that focuses on technology roles, on Wednesday began offering a paid search tool that helps recruiters identify job candidates who are women, of particular races or ethnicities, or who served in the military.

Entelo will charge existing customers—currently about 125 companies, including Facebook Inc. and Yelp Inc., that hire a lot of engineers and developers—$10,000 or more per year to conduct targeted searches for candidates from traditionally underrepresented groups. For example, a recruiter could search for JavaScript engineers in the Bay Area who are Hispanic, or female Python developers in Nashville.

While tools that help companies find specialized talent are nothing unusual, the technology powering the new product, called Entelo Diversity, make strike some as unsettling. Read More »

In general, experts say, boards hesitate to choose newcomers without experience as public-company directors. So women and minorities with expertise are more likely to land multiple directorships than whites. About 34% of black women, 20% of Hispanic women, 19.1% of all women and 19.8% of black men held at least two seats, the study found. The overall figure for men was 15%.

“Recruiting women and minorities to boards is being slowed because of boards’ unwillingness to look at candidates who have not yet served on boards,” said Ron Lumbra, co-leader of the CEO and board services practice for Russell Reynolds. “There’s a premium on experience,’’ he added. Read More »

Kimberly-Clark Corp., the maker of Huggies diapers and Kotex feminine products, has a customer base that is 83% female. But a few years ago, amid a push to boost sales and earnings through new product innovation, bosses realized the company’s leadership did not reflect that base.

Even members of the board wondered where the women were, raising the issue in an executive-level meeting in 2009.

When President Obama spoke up in support of his “gay brothers and sisters” at the inauguration in January, businesses around the country knew what he was talking about.

Today, many corporations have LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) affinity groups and offer bereavement leave to employees mourning the death of a partner. Some even “gross up” to eliminate the tax disadvantages to LGBT employees who cannot file federal tax returns with their partners as married couples.

Yet 41% of LGBT professionals in the United States remain remain closeted, according to a survey released Monday by the Center for Talent Innovation, a non-profit research organization that polled 978 college-educated white-collar U.S. workers. Read More »

Diversity makes for better decisions in the long run, some businesses find.

Companies may be coming around to a business case for diversity and inclusion.

Sixty-three percent of firms cited “access to top talent” as a main driver behind their diversity and inclusion initiatives, ahead of more traditional motivations like “fair treatment” (60%) and “public pressure” (21%), according to a new study.

The findings, released Wednesday by executive search firm Egon Zehnder International, indicate that companies are taking a more “progressive” view on workplace dynamics, says Lisa Blais, co-leader of the firm’s U.S. Diversity Council. Read More »

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